a ;
Obama now has been told what Israel said months ago - Assad has used gas against his own people. Obama's red line, the one he laid down, has been crossed. So what does he do when faced with an avowedly tough decision? He dithers and says he will discuss it with our allies. More leading from behind?
Ole Bill Clinton sent a shot across Obama's bow today.
---
.jpg)
.jpg)
---
Is Clapper an unwitting liar! Seems so. Therefore, he should feel right at home in the Obama Administration!
---
More obstruction by State Department from higher ups? The State Department has learned the art of white washing what it does not like the public knowing. The operatives are alleged former Clinton associates. (See 1 below.)
---
Is the GOP clueless? (See 2 below.)
---
David Victor Hanson and America's margin of error. We have it but can lose it. (See 3 below.)
---
This video is hilarious by itself but it also offers a fabulous lesson in personalities . Recognize who flanked Reagan. Can you imagine Obama in the same audience, laughing and flanked by politicians of the opposite party?
This should give you some insight what is wrong with the country in a very human way. Who would you like to be on an island with - Reagan or Obama?
http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=n6mbW-jMtrY&feature=player_detailpage
---
Dick
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1)Leaked Memo: State Dept- Blocked Probe Into Honduras Shootings
The Mosquitia region
near the remote community of Ahuas, Honduras, is where a joint Honduran-U.S.
drug raid in May 2012 is said to have have mistakenly targeted civilians.
By
Sandy Fitzgerald
Two pregnant women and two men were killed after Honduran national police opened fire on their small boat. Police said drugs were involved, but local residents said the boat was full of people fishing, and their deaths sparked riots in the Central American country's streets.
The shots were fired from a State Department-owned helicopter, and two Drug Enforcement Administration agents were involved, an agency spokeswoman admitted. However, the DEA insists its agents did not fire the shots.
The leaked memo, from 2012, says the DEA agents were under the authority of the State Department's chief of mission in Honduras and funded by a counter-narcotics program, and were "subject to investigation" by State.
But when the investigation began, "despite requests by the U.S. ambassador to Honduras and congressional pressure, DEA reportedly [was] not cooperating," the memo continues.
A State
Department agent interviewed William Brownfield, the assistant secretary for
international narcotics and law-enforcement affairs, “who reportedly was not
forthcoming and gave the impression” that State “should not pursue the
investigation," say claims in the leaked internal document.
The DEA claimed it never fired any of the rounds in the incident, and that the people in the boat fired first, so the Honduran police acted in self-defense.
But residents in Honduras protested the shootings, burning down government buildings and demanding American drug agents leave the area, reports The New York Times.
American and Honduran security officials claim that two traffickers were killed during the operation, which yielded 1,000 pounds of cocaine.
The Honduran incident has for months prompted demands from human-rights groups and lawmakers wanting to know how involved DEA agents were, The Washington Times reported earlier this year.
While an investigation last year cleared the DEA of any wrongdoing, 58 House delegates in January sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry and Attorney General Eric Holder, calling the probe "deeply flawed."
The latest cover-up allegations against the State Department add to the furor caused this week when Aurelia Fedenisn, a former State Department inspector general, accused higher-ups of hiding the findings from another investigative report. That report says members of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's security detail and a U.S. ambassador solicited prostitutes. State denies all the claims.
The diplomat has since been revealed as Howard Gutman, ambassador to Belgium. He told The New York Daily News on Tuesday he is "angered and saddened by the baseless allegations."
Investigation into the cases has been opened by both the GOP-run House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Democrat-run Senate Foreign Relations Committee, with Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina saying "the sanitizing of these reports explains Benghazi."
The DEA claimed it never fired any of the rounds in the incident, and that the people in the boat fired first, so the Honduran police acted in self-defense.
But residents in Honduras protested the shootings, burning down government buildings and demanding American drug agents leave the area, reports The New York Times.
American and Honduran security officials claim that two traffickers were killed during the operation, which yielded 1,000 pounds of cocaine.
The Honduran incident has for months prompted demands from human-rights groups and lawmakers wanting to know how involved DEA agents were, The Washington Times reported earlier this year.
While an investigation last year cleared the DEA of any wrongdoing, 58 House delegates in January sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry and Attorney General Eric Holder, calling the probe "deeply flawed."
The latest cover-up allegations against the State Department add to the furor caused this week when Aurelia Fedenisn, a former State Department inspector general, accused higher-ups of hiding the findings from another investigative report. That report says members of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's security detail and a U.S. ambassador solicited prostitutes. State denies all the claims.
The diplomat has since been revealed as Howard Gutman, ambassador to Belgium. He told The New York Daily News on Tuesday he is "angered and saddened by the baseless allegations."
Investigation into the cases has been opened by both the GOP-run House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Democrat-run Senate Foreign Relations Committee, with Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina saying "the sanitizing of these reports explains Benghazi."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2)Three Signs Republicans Haven't Learned Any Lessons From 2012
After last year's drubbing, Republicans vowed to change their ways. But as 2013 wears on, they’re sticking to the script that got them in trouble.
By Josh Kraushaar
To much acclaim, the Republican National Committee released its road map for reform in March, emphasizing that the path to success called for moderating the party's position on immigration, courting a more diverse set of officeholders, and building the GOP around pragmatic governors rather than polarizing members of Congress.
Three months later, those recommendations seem to have already been forgotten. Party leaders in Washington anonymously rebuked New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie for his self-interested scheduling of a Senate special election, treating a rare blue-state conservative governor like a pariah. As the debate on immigration heats up in Congress, the majority of House Republicans cast a symbolic vote rejecting President Obama's executive order to end deportations of young people brought to this country illegally as children. In Massachusetts, the party nominated a Hispanic military veteran who is within striking distance of winning a Senate seat, but few major donors are giving money to his campaign.
"This is the world's longest psychotherapy session. Everyone's trying to talk their way through what happened in 2012. The more they talk, the more they enjoy the therapy session," said Republican strategist Brad Todd, who is working for Gabriel Gomez, the GOP nominee in the Bay State.
The composite is a party stuck in the status quo despite its leaders' public hand-wringing. Much of the desire for change is coming from the top, while the more-populist conservative grassroots—skeptical of wide-ranging legislation and disdainful of pragmatic problem-solvers—are pulling in another direction.
The disconnect is on full display in this month's Massachusetts special election, which features Gomez, a former Navy SEAL pitching himself as a new kind of Republican who is moderate on gun control, immigration, and the environment. He's just the type of nominee the Republican leadership is looking for—especially in a deeply Democratic state—and public polls show he has a chance against Democratic Rep. Edward Markey, a 37-year Capitol Hill veteran. Yet Gomez hasn't won the enthusiasm of the donor class or received much assistance from any outside Republican groups, including the establishment-centered American Crossroads and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. "The moderate donors want to be certain their investment is going to pay off. The conservative donors want to make sure the candidate won't do something they disagree with," Todd said. "Add all that up, what it comes down to: People are scared to engage."
Another big election in 2013 is in New Jersey, where Gov. Christie is well positioned to win a second term despite running in a solidly Democratic state. But among Republican officials in Washington over the past week, he's being branded a traitor because of his scheduling of a special election to fill the seat of the late Democratic Sen. Frank Lautenberg. Christie picked a date in October, ensuring that the race won't interfere with his own November election—but also alienating Republicans who hoped to make an aggressive push for the Senate seat. In the interim, Christie appointed state Attorney General Jeffrey Chiesa, who is not running for the seat. With the election just four months away, Republicans didn't have enough time to recruit a competitive candidate. (Steve Lonegan, a conservative who unsuccessfully challenged Christie in the 2009 gubernatorial primary, is expected to be the party's standard-bearer for the Senate.)
Christie's allies say the carping overlooks the fact that the governor faced few good choices. He could boost Democratic turnout by scheduling the special election in November or likely lose a messy court battle if he tried to engage in a partisan fight over delaying it until 2014. Neither would burnish his standing as one of the rare center-right Republicans who's as popular with independents and Democrats as he is within his own party.
Christie's broad appeal could make him a potentially potent force in the 2016 presidential election—the straight-talking, blue-state conservative governor who has built politically savvy relationships with Democrats, including President Obama (on hurricane recovery), Newark Mayor Cory Booker (on education reform), and several state legislative leaders (to pass his landmark pension reforms). It's those very relationships, particularly his working partnership with Obama, that have soured his relationship with the base, however. And it's his desire to protect his standing in New Jersey that has burned bridges with party chiefs in Washington. But there's no denying Christie has made himself a widely popular Republican, the type that's in short supply these days within the party.
"There's a cognitive disconnect between what we need and what we have right here in front of us in New Jersey. They're missing the connection," one Christie ally said. "When they say 'pragmatic,' it sounds great on paper, but not in reality. Conservatives can't stand the fact he had a productive relationship with President Obama in the wake of Sandy."
Meanwhile, the most significant gap between the RNC's recommendations and the GOP reality remains on the issue of immigration. The dissonance is less about individual lawmakers' positions on the comprehensive immigration reform being debated in the Senate than the tonal insensitivity the party often conveys to Hispanic voters.
Case in point: Last week, Rep. Steve King of Iowa, an immigration hard-liner, cosponsored an amendment to defund the program Obama initiated that allowed children of illegal immigrants to remain in the United States. King's rhetoric on immigration was considered so politically toxic that Senate Republican strategists urged him to stay out of Iowa's Senate race, fearing he could cost them a battleground seat. But all but six House Republicans voted for his legislation, including most members in swing districts.
"It reinforces a tone of insensitivity that is just beyond baffling," said one senior Republican official.
The party's own political and policy recommendations are falling on deaf ears. The establishment isn't fully getting behind a compelling blue-state Senate candidate out of fear that its money could go to waste. The grassroots are driving even pragmatic conservative representatives well to the right of public opinion on immigration. And both are rebuking their most popular governor even though he boasts conservative credentials. Welcome to the GOP, circa 2013.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3)America's vast margin of error
Even with budget cuts, the U.S. military will allot more to defense than what the next 10 nations spend on their militaries combined. America manages to do this, while investing less than 5 percent of its GDP, primarily because its economy remains the world's largest, most productive and most innovative.
By Victor Davis Hanson
The Obama administration is facing scandals everywhere -- using the IRS to punish political enemies, seizing the phone records of Associated Press and Fox News reporters, monitoring phone and email accounts of millions, and making up stories about what happened in Benghazi.
In other words, the sort of government overreach that hardly raises eyebrows in Russia , China and most of Africa and Latin America is felonious here in the freest society in the world. Because of America's unique Constitution, and especially the Bill of Rights, for over two centuries Americans have taken as their birthright privacy and free expression, so that even the slightest infringement becomes cause for outrage -- and correction.
We also have wide margins of error in energy. President Obama still keeps the Keystone Pipeline on hold. He has frozen almost all new gas and oil leasing on America's vast public lands. Yet throughout the 2012 campaign, the president also boasted that gas and oil drilling inthe United States had reached all-time highs.
Despite, not because of, the president's efforts, production rose due to a long history of protecting private property rights and ownership of subterranean resources. The country also inherited a can-do tradition of private enterprise using innovative new technology to cut costs and increase efficiency.
In contrast, much of Europe has outlawed fracking. Elsewhere there is not the expertise to use sophisticated recovery techniques. Only in the United States can the private oil and gas sector not so easily be shut down. The result is that the president has the luxury of lauding record production while doing his utmost to stop it.
With the Obama administration's scheduled Pentagon cuts, on top of the sequester reductions, about $1 trillion over the next decade will be slashed from the military budget. The president still is fighting a war in Afghanistan , has intervened in Libya , and for two years has threatened to use force to help topple Bashar Assad of Syria . Obama can oversee massive military reductions, and yet project force almost anywhere in the world, precisely because he inherited the largest, most potent armed forces in the history of civilization.
Even with budget cuts, the U.S. military will allot more to defense than what the next 10 nations spend on their militaries combined. America manages to do this, while investing less than 5 percent of its GDP, primarily because its economy remains the world's largest, most productive and most innovative.
Elements of American universities are increasingly subject to global ridicule. Annual tuition customarily soars far beyond the rate of inflation. Aggregate student debt is now unsustainable. A lost generation of unemployed youth fails to translate their questionable degrees into well-paying jobs.
Colleges waste money on the superfluous, from rocking-climbing walls to diversity czars. College catalogs now include offerings such as Dartmouth's "Queer Marriage, Hate Crimes and Will and Grace: Contemporary Issues in LGBT Studies" and Harvard's "Race, Gender, and Ethnicity in Martin Scorsese and Spike Lee ."
American universities have the luxury of offering the inane precisely because their math, science and computer departments, along with their medical and business schools, would never offer such fluff. In other words, the meritocratic protocols of institutions such as Caltech,MIT , Stanford Medical School and Harvard Business School are so successful in turning out the world's most gifted graduates that they can afford to subsidize the widely publicized but otherwise shallow and politically correct nonsense.
The same paradox is true of the green movement. The United States has the luxury to waste billions of dollars subsidizing a failed Solyndra or insolvent electric car companies because it has the richest coal -- and soon, gas and oil -- deposits in the world.
Californians have shut down huge swaths of irrigated farmland to save a bait fish in theSacramento-San Joaquin Delta and to restore 19th-century salmon runs in the state's rivers. Sometimes even more radically they dream of blowing up the Hetch Hetchy dam to return to a premodern landscape in the central Sierra Nevada mountains.
These realities and fantasies assume that California farmers will remain the most productive and innovative in the world, and the nation's food supply both the cheapest and safest. And only because long-forgotten engineers once crafted a brilliant system of dams, canals and hydroelectric projects can the present generation of Californians -- well fed, watered and powered -- indulge in fantasies about discarding them.
At some point, our margins of error will disappear and with them the indulgent toying with our freedoms, defense, energy, education and food. Americans will then have to reawaken and act more like our no-nonsense predecessors -- if our successors are to inherit what we have taken for granted.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
No comments:
Post a Comment